City and town life -- Fiction; Urban poor -- Fiction
"Shall I stop him and speak to him?" thought Janet, as she listened to
the heavy step; then, after a few moments' hesitation, "No," she said,
"but I will keep watch."
That Janet intended to keep her word was evident from the fact that she
hurried back to her room, where the window was still half open, and
looking out cautiously to make sure who was the man with whom D. Wragg
had been in dispute, there, as she had expected, was Mr John Screwby in
one of his favourite attitudes--that of leaning with his back up against
a lamp-post, staring heavily at the house, and, drunk or sober, full of
exuberant action, which manifested itself in nods and shakes of the head
and fist. His anger could be heard, too, in low and ominous growls,
similar to those emitted by caged wild beasts when their keeper forces
them to display their noble proportions by stirring them up with a long
pole.
At last, though, Janet had the satisfaction of seeing the brute slouch
away, but not without turning once more to shake his fist at the door,
as he said a few words which did not reach the listener's ear, and then
he was gone.
The words were loudly enough spoken, but they were drowned by the
rattling wheels of a passing cart; the utterance, though, seemed to give
Mr John Screwby the greatest satisfaction, promising to his animal heart
the gratification of a grudge; for the words were--
"I'll have it out o' some on yer for this!"
Volume 2, Chapter XIV.
BROUGHT HOME.
Whish-ish! whoosh-oosh! over and over again, Ichabod had pumped the
wind-chest full, till the handle came down heavily, and the boy had
balanced himself upon it with the hard wood deeply impressing his
stomach, and enjoyed the luxury of a ride down. Then he had seen the
little leaden weight run up again, as the wind slowly filtered out. But
though he repeated the process some half-dozen times, no stops were
drawn out, no loud chords came pealing from the organ, and at last,
tired out with pumping wind for nothing, Ichabod Gunniss spun the little
weight about, and pulled at it until he broke the string, and saw the
end disappear inside the organ-case, when he pulled out his
pocket-knife, whetted it a while upon the sole of his ill-shaped shoe,
and, for about the twentieth time, he began to carve that eternal "I.G."
upon the back of the organ-case. But, in spite of the whetting, the
knife was blunt; and though, by going with the grain of the wood,
Ichabod had no difficulty in making a capital I; yet, as soon as he came
to the grand curves of the capital G, he found out the difficulty of his
task, and after a few slips and slides, he gave the thing up in despair.
Jared was in the curtain-hung pew, but he had not been heard to move for
quite half an hour. Perhaps he was composing a new voluntary, perhaps
asleep; but all was perfectly still, so Ichabod looked about for
something with which to amuse himself.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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